The night before last I popped out to my medic garden to see how many snails were around. I had noticed more and more plants vanishing, and the plants that were still around had big slimy trails all over them. It kinda put me right off the mint, seeing it with snot all over the leaves.

Anyhoo' I popped out at about 11.30pm and the place was crawling in slugs and snails! My herb garden is surrounded by concrete, so I was quite surprised to see so many of the little shits!

I began gathering them up into a jar, but had to go and get a bucket, as clearly all the slugs and snails were not going to fit in the jar.

Off of 6 containers outside I picked up 14 snails, and 11 slugs!!!!

I tossed some salad into the bucket with the slugs and snails, and placed a cover over the top.

Next day I took the dog for a walk and took my bucket of snails with the plan to release them in thick undergrowth away from my home. I took them across 3 roads and tipped he bucket into a nice patch of weeds and nettles.

Only thing was all the slugs and snails were all still attached to the bucket and I had to pick each one out one-by-one and put them in the nettles. By this time the bucket was full of this watery slime and although I actually find snails cute, I was really wanting to heave!

I was also getting a lot of strange looks, as I had decided to release the snails during the peak time for people walking their kids to school!

Last night I expected to find the same huge numbers of slugs and snails, and had my bucket all ready... I had also heard horror stories of people marking snails with nail varnish before they have released them into the wild, only to find the majority of marked snails back in their garden within days.

Wouldn't it be funny if a few people in that area had marked snails with nail varnish, and the snails they thought had returned were actually someone elses marked snails! I think if I try the marking experiment I will place a big C on them, then I'll know they are mine.

The next time they return I will paint their shells so brightly and so temptingly for birds.... That way I won't have to deal with them